1. What Is a Verb?
What is a
verb? Songs, poems and language teachers throughout history have attempted to
explain verbs to us. A verb is an action word, Luv Is a Verb, Everything’s
a Verb, where does it end? The concept of verbs is sort of a tricky one to
grasp, and then once you do, verbs only get more confusing.
Defining
a Verb
A
brilliant professor once said that “a verb is a word that does verb-y things.”
He said the same thing about nouns (they do noun-y things) and other
parts of speech as well, and while it’s not a very concrete or satisfying
definition, it’s probably the best one out there.
You see,
the way English works is that every word sits in a specific place and plays a
specific role in a sentence. And even though a word might not really even
be a real word, if it’s playing the role of the verb, then it’s a verb.
Look at these examples:
Look at these examples:
ü As I phlomoggled my
yard, I accidentally shallimped two birds.
ü Jack pazotors as
often as he can.
ü They couldn’t believe she had
never chorstined before.
ü This time next week, we’ll
be forrisking through the jungle!
If you
speak English fairly well, you can identify the verbs in those sentences even
though they aren’t real words. You can do this because they are doing verb-y
things. They have -ing, -ed and -s endings depending on when they happen and
who is doing them. They also follow the subjects of the sentences and
appear next to adverbs. And even though we don’t know what they mean, they
somehow convey action. They behave like verbs.
2. What Is a Modifer ?
A modifier is
an optional element in phrase structure
or clause structure.A modifier is so called because it is said
to modify (change the meaning of) another element in the
structure, on which it is dependent. Typically the modifier can be removed
without affecting the grammar of the sentence. For example, in
the English sentence This is a red ball, the adjective red is
a modifier, modifying the noun ball. Removal of the modifier
would leave This is a ball, which is grammatically correct and
equivalent in structure to the original sentence.
Other
terms used with a similar meaning are qualifier (the
word qualify may be used in the same way as modify in
this context), attribute, and adjunct. These concepts
are often distinguished from complements and arguments,
which may also be considered dependent on another element, but are considered
an indispensable part of the structure. For example, in His face became
red, the word red might be called a complement or argument
of became, rather than a modifier or adjunct, since it cannot be
omitted from the sentence.
3. Make a Setence
A sentence is a group of words which starts with a
capital letter and ends with a full stop (.), question mark (?) or exclamation
mark (!). A sentence contains or implies a predicate and a subject.Sentences
contain clauses.Simple sentences have one clause.Compound
sentences and complex sentences have two or more clauses.
Sentences can
contain subjects and objects.The subject in a sentence is
generally the person or thing carrying out an action. The object in a sentence
is involved in an action but does not carry it out, the object comes after the
verb.
For examples:
For examples:
The boy climbed a tree.
If you want to say more about the subject (the boy)
or the object (the tree), you can add an adjective.For example:
The young boy climbed a tall tree.
If you want to say more about how he climbed the
tree you can use an adverb.
For example:
The young boy quickly climbed a tall tree.
The sentence becomes more interesting as it gives
the reader or listener more information.
